Sheriff Virgil said, "Leroy and me grew up here together. He was the center and I was the quarterback on the high school football team that won the county championship forty years ago. He's not riding around killing anybody. And that feller there, easy to see he's not the sharpshooting type."
The FBI agent tossed back Leroy's license and looked at his fellow feds. "Clean," he muttered in a disappointed tone.
"Where you headed?" another slicker said as he glanced at the half-loaded truck.
"Same place I'm always headed this time of the morning this time of the year. We take us some wood down to folks who ain't got time to chop their own, and sell it before the cold weather sets in. Then we get down to the marina and work on the boat. Maybe take it out if the seas clear up."
"You got a boat?" one agent said sharply.
Leroy looked over at Virgil with a comical expression. "Yeah, got me a big-ass yacht." He pointed behind him. "We like to take us a ride in that there Chesapeake Bay and maybe catch us a few crabs. I hear tell they like that shit round these parts."
"Cut the crap, Leroy, before you get yourself in trouble," Virgil said quickly. "This is serious."
"I believe it is," Leroy shot back. "But if a man's dead, you best not waste any more time jawing with us. 'Cause we ain't know nuthin' 'bout nuthin'."
"You see anybody pass this way this morning?"
"Not one car till you folks come tearing up. And we both been up before full light."
Stone limped over to the truck and started throwing wood in the cargo bed.
The agents looked at each other. One of them mumbled, "Let's roll."
A few seconds later they were gone.
Leroy walked over to the truck and started tossing wood in. "Wonder what man be dead?" he said, really to himself. "Important man, they say. Lot of important men in this world. But they die just like the rest of us. God's way of making life fair."
Stone let out a long, loud grunt.
Leroy looked over at him and grinned. "Hey man, now that's the smartest thing I heard all damn morning."
When the day's work was over, Stone pantomimed to Leroy that he was heading on. Leroy seemed to take it well. "Surprised you lasted long as you did. Good luck." He peeled off a few faded twenties and handed them over. Stone took the money, patted the man's back and limped off.
After packing his duffel, Stone set out on foot and hitchhiked to D.C. in the back of a truck, the driver unwilling to let the scruffy Stone ride with him in the warmth of the truck's cab. Stone didn't mind. It would give him time to think. And he had a lot to think about. He had just killed two of the most prominent men in the country on the same day, literally hours apart, using the rifle he'd earlier chucked into the ocean before taking the dive off the cliffs.
The truck dropped him off near the Foggy Bottom area of the capital and Stone set out for his old home at Mt. Zion Cemetery.
He had a letter to deliver.
And something to pick up.
And then it would be time to hit the road.
His alter ego John Carr was finally dead.
And the odds were awfully good that Oliver Stone might be right behind him.
CHAPTER 2
THE COTTAGE WAS DARK, the cemetery darker still. The only thing visible was the mist of Stone's exhaled breath as it mingled with cool air. His gaze penetrated to every square inch of the cemetery because he could not afford any screwups now. It was stupid coming here, but loyalty was not a choice he felt, it was a duty. And it was who he was. At least they couldn't take that away from him.
He'd waited nearby for about a half hour to see if anything looked strange. His place had been watched for a couple months after he'd abandoned it. He knew this because he'd been watching the watchers. However, after four months of him not being around, they'd given up their sentinel and moved on. That didn't mean they wouldn't come back. And after the events of this morning, they probably would. All cops would you tell you that every violently ended life was worth the same level of investigation. Yet the reality was, the more important the victim the more diligent the hunt. And based on that maxim they would be bringing an army on this one.
Finally satisfied, he crawled underneath the fence at the back of the cemetery and crept to a large headstone. He yanked it over, revealing underneath the small compartment scooped out of the dirt. He took the box hidden there and put it in his duffel bag, then set the stone back in place. He patted the grave marker affectionately. The name of the deceased who lay here had long since been worn away by time. But Stone had researched the people who'd been buried at Mt. Zion and knew that this was the final resting place of one Samuel Washington, a freed slave who'd given his life to help others like him to freedom. He felt a certain kinship with the fellow because in a way Stone knew just what it was like to not be free.
He eyed the cottage in a dusk rushing headfirst to nightfall. He knew Annabelle Conroy had been staying there. Her rental was parked at the front gate. And he'd been inside the cottage when she'd been absent from it a couple months ago. The place looked far better than when he'd lived there. Yet he knew he could never reside at Mt. Zion again unless it was in a supine position approximately six feet underground. With the two early morning pulls of the trigger he'd become the most wanted man in America.
He wondered where she was tonight. Hopefully, out enjoying life, although since the news of the two murders was everywhere, he knew that his friends would easily deduce what had happened. He hoped they didn't think less of him. That actually was the real reason he was here tonight.
He didn't want to leave his friends hanging out there for him. The feds weren't incompetent. They would be coming this way eventually. Stone wished with all his heart he could do more for the Camel Club, after all they had done for him. He had thought of simply turning himself in. But there was such a core of survivor mentality built into his psyche that his essentially walking to his own execution was not an option. He could not let them win that way. They would have to work a little harder.
The letter he held was carefully worded. It was not a confession because that would put his friends in an even greater dilemma. Granted, Stone was caught in a classic catch-22, but he owed them something. He should have known that with the life he'd led there was only one possible conclusion.
This.
He slipped the letter from his pocket and rolled it around the hilt of a knife he pulled from another pocket, securing it with string. He took aim from the darkness of the side yard and let fly. The knife stuck into the porch column.
"Good-bye."
He had one more place to visit.
A few moments later he was crawling back under the fence. He walked to the Foggy Bottom Metro station and climbed on the train. Later, a thirty-minute walk brought him to yet another cemetery.
Why was it he was more comfortable with the dead than the living? The answer was relatively simple. The dead conveniently never asked questions.
Even in the darkness he quickly found the grave he was looking for. He knelt down, brushed some leaves away and gazed at the tombstone.
Here lay Milton Farb, the other member of the Camel Club, and the only deceased one. Yet even dead, Milton would forever be part of that informal band of conspiracy theorists who'd insisted on only one thing: the truth.
Too bad their leader hadn't honored that principle.
The only reason his beloved friend was dead was because of Stone.
My fault.
Because of him, the brilliant if quirky Milton was resting here for all time now, a large-caliber round having ended his life underneath the United States Capitol. It nearly equaled the grief Stone felt for the death of his poor wife decades ago.